Some shoppers who showed up at stores Thursday night ended up making purchases online. Megan Sullivan, 26, was too far back in line at the Best Buy electronics retailer in Aurora, Colo., to receive a voucher for the 50-inch Toshiba TV she wanted, selling for $399. Instead, she bought left and ended up buying a 40-inch Samsung TV on Amazon for $427.

"While it would have been better to get the one at Best Buy," she says, "it wasn't worth getting in line any earlier." Sullivan showed up to Best Buy around 8:30 p.m. Thursday for the midnight opening.

Ultimately, the competition between online and bricks-and-mortar stores means Black Friday and Cyber Monday are becoming one and the same, says Matt Shay, CEO of National Retail Federation.

"What we're going to see is that the two become further and further indistinguishable from one another," he says. "Everyone is playing everywhere now."

On average, almost 41% of a consumer's total spending for the weekend was online, the BIGInsight survey shows. The online shopping continues, with more than half of consumers planning to shop Cyber Monday, according to BIGInsight. The number of shoppers online today is expected to hit 129 million, up from about 122 million last year, the data show.

Online sales for Thanksgiving and Black Friday — days that retailers have either traditionally never been open (Thanksgiving) or have boasted strictly in-store sales — were up almost 20% from the same two days in 2011, according to data from IBM Smarter Commerce.

Thursday is also encroaching on Black Friday as retailers choose to open earlier on Thanksgiving night. Walmart, Sears and Toys R Us were among retailers that opened doors at 8 p.m. Thursday.

Viewers huddle under umbrellas in a heavy rain in downtown Seattle as they watch their annual Macy's Holiday Parade. Elaine Thompson, AP

"The early Thursday openings kind of bleached some of the money out of Friday," says Bill Martin, founder of ShopperTrak.

Millennials drove the earliest Black Friday traffic, with nearly 37% of 18- to 34 year-olds at stores before or by midnight on Thanksgiving, the BIGInsight data show. The same number of 35- to 54 year-olds were at stores by 10 a.m. Friday, when Millennials dropped to about 28% in stores.

Foot traffic on Black Friday was up 3.5% with more than 300 million store visits, the ShopperTrak data show. Martin says it's because more consumers were walking into stores to browse but weren't necessarily buying.